Vincent Valentine. Turk. Genetically engineered horror. Professor Natalie Long has fantasized the day she would find his resting place. A scientist who studied under Professor Gast, she believes she has found the means to cure him of the darker side to his nature. But when the cure could lead to his death, she isn't so certain she can live without him.

The thought
drifted through her fogged mind as she set the flower on the top of
the tombstone. No, it wasn't supposed to have ended that way. He was
supposed to have been cured. He was supposed to have taken her in his
arms and made her feel whole. A part of him. Forever bonded in a way
that would never be shared with another soul... Her heart writhed in
agony, and she lowered her gaze to the freshly turned soil that hid
her one and only love from view.

Natalie dropped
to her knees and clutched at the earth with a soul felt sob. "You
weren't supposed to die, Vincent," she screeched through her
tears. But her voice was only a choked moan.

"Natalie?
Why are you here?"

Natalie hunched
over, digging her fingers deeper into the cool soil. The temptation
to dig out his body nearly overwhelmed her. "I can't leave him
alone. Not here. Not anywhere. He needed to be loved. I needed to
love him... Oh God, why didn't I just leave him alone? Why did I have
to find him?" Her throat closed over the words, and her
shoulders racked with tears.

"You gave
him new life," the voice whispered in her ear. "You
released his soul from torment and gave him peaceful rest. You gave
him what no one else could offer. Love and serenity. Would you take
it back?"

"Yes,"
Natalie rasped in desperation. "If it meant he'd still be alive,
I would!"

"Then what
of me?" Hands from the mysterious voice took hold of her arms
and gently made her look up. "Dearest Natalie, don't you love
me?"

Natalie gasped,
her gaze swallowed by the dark and rich brown depths of Vincent--

--Natalie sat up
with a groan, sliding from the bed as she covered her face with her
hands. "A dream. It was a dream. It was only a dream," she
mumbled over and over.

A dream that
had, again, seemed so real. Too real. It spoke volumes, revealing
what she believed to be the truth. She killed one so the other could
live. She put one to rest so she could live the remainder of her days
in happiness with the one she loved more than anything. Natalie
turned to look over her shoulder at Vincent's still form. Her body
followed. There you are. Her eyes clouded with tears as she
slowly stepped forward, leaning her hands against the bed and letting
her head fall forward as the tears dripped to the sheet.

Waiting had
never been such hell.

...The darkness
pushed in at Vincent with suffocating clarity. Beasts' howls and
inhuman groans of anger, misery, and uncontrolled fury and vengeance.
Leering at him. Accusing him of forgetting their power in his life
and taking what they gave him for granted. He pushed away from them,
scrambling backward.

"I never
wanted you! I never wanted your power or your presence!" Vincent
raged. A claw took hold of his arm and ripped at his sleeve. He
jerked free, flinching as the talons tore into his flesh. "Your
strength wanes, dark spirits. Your life force drains. Your power
ebbs. Could it be that her lovely hands have bound you?"

They howled, and
the red eyes that glowed in the darkness faded to mere shadows.
Whispers of inhumanity and callousness.

Vincent stood to
his feet, pulling a sleek gun from a holster on his hip. "I bid
thee farewell, Hojo. All your creations will vanish. All your power
ceases to exist in this world I've chosen. In this life I share with
a pure woman. Do you feel it? Do you taste the bitterness of defeat
on your lips."

He shot into the
darkness and heard a wail of death. "You creatures of the night
will receive no more shadows. No more feeding from the despair long
harbored in my soul. I am free of you." Vincent laughed, firing
into the night again and again and again.

A figure leaped
from the gloom and tackled him, burying its teeth and claws into his
flesh. Vincent pushed and beat at the thing with his gun and fists,
but still it dug in. Vincent bit back a growl of pain and shoved the
barrel of his gun under the thing's chin. Their eyes locked. Red and
Brown. Vincent and Vincent.

"She wants
me," it hissed. "You are weak. You are not enough to
satisfy her hunger."

Vincent's eyes
blackened with rage. "She wants me, for she is the one
who designed the cure from you."

The two
grappled, dodging blows and causing bruises to form and blood to
fall. Minutes faded to hours but still they fought, hurling insults
and fists. Vincent detected a deterioration of strength in his hated
alter ego and seized the opportunity, kicking him back and scrambling
to his feet. Red Vincent glared up at him and the barrel of his gun.

"You cannot
kill what you know yourself to be," it said harshly.

"I can kill
what I detest, creation of Hojo. You."

Red Vincent's
eyes widened in fear.

He fired...

blackness
swallowed

pasts
exploded outward

...Vincent looked
around him. He was in Nibelheim outside the Shinra mansion, ages
before Sephiroth had become twisted with his evil desire for godhood.

He focused his
attention on the solitary figure standing outside the gate of the
Shinra Mansion and blinked with surprise. "Lucrecia."

Lucrecia faced
him, expression sorrowful. "Vincent." She looked down,
removing her glasses to self-consciously tuck them into the breast
pocket of her white lab coat. "You've been gone a long time."

"I know."

Lucrecia looked
up. "Why?"

Vincent heard a
whisper on the breeze and looked behind him. "I have a chance
for a different life now," he told her absently. No one
approached. He focused again on Lucrecia's pained expression. "A
chance at a better one. With a woman who loves what I am, what I was,
and what I could be."

Her eyes
darkened. "Do you love her?"

Vincent nodded,
something within making him keep his distance from the shade of his
past. "I do." Another whisper was heard, and he again
turned to look behind him, eyes searching the horizon and the town.

"You once
said you loved me," she accused softly.

Vincent turned.
"I did. But that was another life. Another Vincent."

Lucrecia
frowned. "Another Vincent? There is no other Vincent.
There is you, and you said you loved me. What right
does she have to take you away?"

Vincent watched
her face for a long moment, waiting for any hint of the tenderness
he'd once felt. It didn't come. "As you made your decision to be
with Hojo, I've made my decision to be with her."

"Because
she gave you what you wanted," she retorted. "She's
manipulating you!"

"No,"
Vincent pressed, "because I love her."

Lucrecia's face
twisted with misery.

"I love
her, Lucrecia," he said again. "I want to dream of her.
I want her to bear my children. I want to grow old with her."
He shook his head, and the whisper caressed his brain. "You
cannot stay here. There is no longer any place for you in my dreams."

Her chin tilted
upward. "I don't believe you."

"Lucrecia."
Vincent stepped forward to rest a hand on her shoulder. He met her
gaze. "Lucy, rest. Sleep. Remember the good times, as I will,
and let yourself fade to a pleasant memory."

"Vincent...
Vincent, please..."

Vincent dropped
his hand from her shoulder, and he turned to move toward the voice.

He heard a sigh
behind him and the whisper of a kiss on his cheek. "Good-bye,
Vincent. My Turk."

"Good-bye,
Lucrecia."...

...Vincent
opened his eyes and sat up. "Natalie!"

Natalie vaulted
to her feet from the cot at his side, pausing a mere instant before
throwing herself into his arms. "Vincent - thank you God - I
thought you were dying. Vincent. Vincent..." She continued to
sob his name as she kissed his mouth and face.

Vincent pulled
her tight against him, relishing the luscious warmth of her body
against him, the sweet taste of her lips on his, the heavenly sparks
of her hands in his hair, and the blessed freedom of silence in his
mind.

The End

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